Blood On His Hands
by ParaCaerOuVoar
Summary: There’s a first time for everything. This was Dean’s first of many days that would define him as not only a Winchester, but as who he was as a man.


This was written for spn_teamfic, over at lj. The prompt was Blood.

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The first thing he remembers about that day is the colour. Red. Scarlet liquid drenching a thick white carpet. He remembers his shoes sinking into the carpet, squelching across the stained red room.

He doesn't see the body at first, too busy quelling the nausea from all the red, telling himself, no, forcing himself not to run like he once had, like a scared child. Then he sees Her, and he can't help it. Stumbling from the room, he staggers outside before expelling his stomach contents into a nearby rose bush. The acid burns his throat and he coughs, hanging his head in shame.

A hand on his shoulder makes him turn, and he looks into the face of his father. He expects a dressing down, but it doesn't come. Instead he looks into caring eyes and a worried mouth opens, telling him it'll be alright, not to worry, he did the exact same thing his first time. He is handed a bottle of water and told to come back in when he can handle it.

He washes his mouth out, draining the bottle quickly, but makes no move to go back inside the house. Instead he sits there, on a stranger's lawn, his hands clammy and shaking, for what seems like eternity.

Eventually, he climbs to his feet and re-enters the house. His stomach recoils, but his mind urges him on, if not for himself, then for the poor dead girl in the living room. He owes it to her to find out what killed her, what snuffed out her life like a candle, with such anger.

Finding the room he fled from, he encounters his father crouching over the body, a look a mild repulsion on his face.

He focuses in on the blood automatically, convincing himself that it's just red paint, that the body is made of wax, like a movie prop. It's all pretend, none of it is real. He repeats it in his head, chanting it over and over again, but he's fooling no-one, least of all himself. The red glistens starkly on the snowy carpet, more vibrant than any paint. The body, too lifelike even in death to be wax. Breathing steadily through his mouth, he crouches down next to his father, earning a look, of what? Approval? Respect? Pride? Maybe all three of them.

His eyes zero in on the corpse, or what's left of it. One leg is perfect, untouched save for the fine red mist covering it. The other is marred, a savage looking wound on it. His face drains of blood as he glimpses the femur, gleaming white surrounded by pulsing red. Eyes travel up her ravaged body, past the light denim skirt hiked halfway up her thighs, over her bared stomach, reaching a ferocious wound, one which surely must be the cause of death. The skin is peeled back, revealing a yellow layer of fat, which has been chewed through, leaving a jagged hole revealing ribs and internal organs. The ribs were splintered, the breastbone ripped in half. The heart is missing, torn straight out of the cavity, leaving a gaping space by the lungs, both of which are sporting ragged gouges, probably obtained in the attackers haste to remove the, most likely still beating, heart. Bile rises in his throat again and he gags, swallowing the urge to vomit with a Herculean effort. Another look from his father, this time satisfaction.

His eyes return to the body, following the bloody trailing of intestines towards an open window. Red glints on the windowsill, and he knows which way the attacker left. Eyes travel up the body again, past small breasts and her shoulders, before he reaches her neck and finally has to look away.

The throat has been torn, cutting through the jugular vein, the carotid artery, through the windpipe, the vocal chords. He can see the spine, a clear liquid dribbling out of the wound, spinal fluid mixing with blood on the carpet. Her face is mercifully left unmarked, although her expression is one of pure terror, frozen forever in a petrified grimace. Blond hair splays around her head, like a heavenly angel. He hears a cough behind him and realizes his father is waiting for his input.

'Uhhh,' he starts, unsure, 'could be a werewolf, or a really sadistic demon, or some really freaky kind of crap we've never seen before.'

'Werewolves rarely take the heart; they prefer the flesh in the legs and stomach.' He can feel himself going green. 'Demons, while strong enough, couldn't make these wounds with a human guise.'

'Which leaves us with freaky crap,' he summarizes, looking at the mutilated corpse in front of them.

'Yup,' his father sighs, standing up as his knees creak in protest. 'I'll get Bobby onto it.'

He nods, standing also, before turning to leave. A face flashes into his mind suddenly, unbidden. His baby brother, safe at law school. He prays to God that Sammy never has to get mixed up with this. Two Winchesters with blood stained hands was more than enough.


End file.
